Safety Patrol Hopes To Get Trip On Track

Like the Little Engine that Could, about 2,400 Palm Beach County Safety Patrol members have not yet given up hope on going by train to Washington, D.C., next spring.

Children and their parents are writing letters to Amtrak, asking to keep the 30-year tradition alive, and principals and teachers are encouraging their students to start petition drives.

Amtrak has said it cannot spare the trains for the student trips.

One letter, written by a Palm Beach Gardens Elementary School fifth grader, closes: ``If we don`t get to go to Washington, we will just have another boring trip to the cafeteria. From Brian, Your Passenger.``

F.E. Spooner, president of the Palm Beach County Safety Patrol Association and principal of Wellington Elementary School, said on Monday that he and two other members of the association will go to Washington on Sept. 26 to confront Graham Claytor, president of Amtrak.

When Spooner had U.S. Reps. Tom Lewis and Harry Johnston and Sen. Bob Graham talk to Claytor in July, Claytor said he would look for some other way to take the 2,400 students expected to go on the trip this year, even if it meant leasing trains elsewhere. Cliff Black, Amtrak`s manager of public affairs, said Claytor is still looking.

Spooner said the Safety Patrol would make any adjustments it could to accommodate Amtrak, but the firm still was not interested.

``No alternatives have been offered to the cancellation of the train,`` he said. ``No alternative dates were suggested; nor was there any indication that more money was needed.``

Last year, the 2,100 students who went paid Amtrak more than $300,000, Spooner said.

``We were loyal to Amtrak when their usage was down and they were having equipment problems,`` he said. ``Several bus lines and airlines wanted us to switch to them. Now we want them to show a little loyalty to us.``

Buses and airplanes would not work for the patrol because there are just too many students, he said.

Black said the issue is not a matter of loyalty. It is just that Amtrak needs all the cars it can get for regularly scheduled trains, he said.